The Great Book Robbery

70,000 Palestinian books were systematically "collected" by the newly born state of Israel during the 1948 war. The story of the "collected" books is at the heart of this film.

Was the appropriation of Palestinian books and manuscripts in 1948 a case of cultural theft or preservation?

On May 15, Palestinians mark the anniversary of the "Nakba", the systematic expulsion of the Palestinian people by Zionist militias that began in late 1947 and lasted through 1948 and beyond.

As well as land and properties, a lesser known aspect of that expulsion is that Israel looted Palestinian homes over their cultural treasures, among them books, manuscripts, personal papers, photographs and works of art.

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50 Comments / User Reviews

dmxi

i guess,you're not of muslim or christian theism?just curious...

Thomas Moore

The British Mandate completed; 1 million Palestinians fled from Israel, but no other Arab country took their Muslim brothers in...at the same time, 1 million Israelites fled from Jordan into Israel and were welcomed. Why no documentaries on what those Jordanian Israelites lost?

robertolapiedra

Maybe there are no documentary because of this...

- Jordan. No Jews lived in Transjordan in 1946 (when it became an independent state), as a result of Winston Churchill's 1921 decision in favor of "preserving [the] Arab character" of Transjordan and the resulting British policy forbidding Jews from settling there.
(Quoted in Aaron S. Klieman, Foundations of British Policy in the Arab World: The Cairo Conference of 1921 (Baltimore, Md.: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1970), p. 230.)

- Legislation passed in 1954 declared that only non-Jews coming from the former British Mandate of Palestine were entitled to Jordanian citizenship.
(Section 3(3) of Jordanian Nationality Law no. 6 of 1954, recorded in Al-Jarida ar-Rasmiya, no. 1171, Feb. 16, 1954, p. 105.)

- What is so striking about Jordan is that although it lacked a Jewish population, it still shared in the general Arab trend of excluding Jews. Further, it actively discriminated against Lebanese and Syrian Jews.

(Anti-Jewish discrimination appears in order no. 1282 of July 1, 1957 (attributed to the Official Gazette of Jordan, no. 1282 by the Collection of Laws and Regulations [in Arabic], vol. 1 issued by the Jordanian Bar, Amman, 1957, p. 186), which exempts Syrian nationals from showing their passports on entering or leaving Jordan. They may use any other identifying document provided that "they are not Jews." The same discriminatory legislation against Jews from Lebanon appears in Majmu'at al-Qawanin wa'l-Anzima, vol. 1 (Amman: Jordanian Bar, 1966), p. 188)

(As for the 'million' number of Palestinians, usually it is estimated more closely to half a million.) Google is a tool, you will always find what you want. If you are the discerning type, you can find objective sources also. RL

Holdem Tycoon

We must evolve to recognize ourselves as earthlings.

robertolapiedra

I find this documentary very interesting. I would enjoy views not tainted by the usual Israeli-Palestinian propaganda as it is getting very old in my opinion. RL.

Guest

You'll have to move to an other planet.
az

ZarathustraSpeaks

I dont think we have that long to wait.

PavolvsBitch

military invasion and takeover 101: destroy the past, displace people; all the better to ferment emnity. we're constantly being fed versions of history and the UN has mandated that public schooling should not focus on history prior to 1950. this is how we all throw our hands up in confused despair when trying to figure out political solutions to this politically created situation. The desired outcome was given in the 'holy books'. what's being shown is a stepping stone to conquest of any people since the marauding psychopathic r*tard race started stealing and raiding instead of working for thier living.

Nir Krasnof Hayat

verey good movie !!

Mordecai Melamed

My parents were born in Iraq to a family that lived there for many generations. In 1950 they experienced the "Farhud" in which Iraqi Jews were attacked and murdered and their property stolen. After an agreement with the Iraqi king, all Iraqi Jews - close to 250,000 people were expelled without being allowed to take any of their possessions. They were forced to leave behind all their homes, valuables and of course books. Were are those books now? My family owned a house in Baghdad. Now it is owned by some Iraqi family. My parents arrived to Israel in 1950 without a penny to their name not to mention books. I respect the Palestinian Nakba, but we also had our own Nakba in Iraq. It was a different world between 1935 to 1950. Let us not forget all the facts. The Palestinian books should be returned to the hands to the Palestinian Authority and returned to their rightful owners. As to our books which we were forced to leave in Iraq - they were burned.

robertolapiedra

Farhud (June 1-2, 1941).
In 1950 your family did not 'experience' the Farhud, and your numbers are double some Jewish estimates. I doubt that your parents 'witnessed' their personal books being burned. I do not doubt that they suffered great distress but if they left in 1950 they forfieted their citizenship, not their property as this came the next year. Please consult Jewish sources below. RL.

Ref: Jewish Virtual Library. Excerpts from article by Mitchell Bard. (This is not considered an 'objective' source of historic information.)

-'In the 1936 Iraq Directory, the “Israelite community” is listed among the various other Iraqi communities, such as Arabs, Kirds, Turkmen, Muslims, Christians, Yazidis and Sabeans, and numbering at about 120,000. Hebrew is also listed as one of Iraq’s six languages.'
-'In 1950, Iraqi Jews were permitted to leave the country within a year provided they forfeited their citizenship. A year later, however, the property of Jews who emigrated was frozen and economic restrictions were placed on Jews who chose to remain in the country. From 1949 to 1951, 104,000 Jews were evacuated from Iraq in Operations Ezra & Nechemia (named after the Jewish leaders who took their people back to Jerusalem from exile in Babylonia beginning in 597 B.C.E.); another 20,000 were smuggled out through Iran.'

TheDanishViking

Ah!, the good old Israel-Palestine conflict! Luckily I can hereby present the only two solutions.

Solution 1:
Build a new Jerusalem. The Jews and the Muslims can throw a coin about who gets the old and who gets the new city.

Solution 2:
Moderate jews must distance themselves from orthodox jewish settlers and moderate muslims must distance themselves from radical islamist. After a few decades time the moderate Israelies and Palestinians will be able to live together (the religious nuts on both sides will sooner or later act with violence against their moderate brothers, but without popular support the radicals will eventually be controlled).

However, if you are religious none of these solutions will of cause work for you and the violence will continue forever (but at least you will leave your children with a strong sense of "identity"*).

wald0

Its hard some times to try and not take sides, to not make judgements about something you know very little about. All I really know of the Palestinian-Jewish conflict is what the powers that be decided I should know. Since in my case the powers that be are the American government, who is not just in bed with Isreal but seems to be presently french kissing its a55, I know nothing. Well, I have spoken with actual Jews and Palestinians but, of course each can tell equally bad horror stories about the other and in the end you sill know nothing really. Here is what I really know about the conflict- Apparently the Jewish people believe that Jarusalem is part of the land given them by God in the pentateuch and that at one time it housed some kind of temple or something (Solomon's temple maybe?) that was very important to their religion. The Muslims also feel that Jarusalem is very important to their religion, I think because it is the place from which Mohammed supposedly ascended to heaven. So over the last couple thousand years these guys have played hot potatoe with this little sh1t hole of a sand box involving the rest of the region and the us western devils along the way. My question is why are we involved or invested in this outcome? Is it because chritianity is based on Jewish writings, or is it because these clowns just happen to be sitting atop the worlds largest supply of liquid dinosaur known to man. I am tempted to say latter is justified by the former but, thats probably because being an atheist I can't really concieve of people buying into a magic carpenter to such a degree that it could fuel this kind of massive investment of life, limb, and cash. It is my opinion that when we solve the energy crisis we will also, as far as we are concerned, solve this issue. Its sort of like turning up the radio to fix the knock in your engine- It may still be happening but you could care less. The only real solution is for both sides of this conflict to realize that there is no God or Allah, no eternal reward for wasting the dawn. So get your kicks before the whole sh1t house goes up in flames and remember- I am the lizard king, I can do anything!!!

I knew Jim had something to say, it took me over twenty years to figure it out though.

Mali Ciko

If the world was so different at the time, why do we bother people today with stories about Hitler, after all, this took place between 1935-1949, and let us not forget the fact that it used to be a different world back then and we should show much more understanding for Hitlers actions since it was not him or the NAZI politics that caused all the problems, it was the age us modern people cant understand(1935-1950) that caused him to act that way. It didnt happen in the 19th century or before, it happened during lifetimes of people around today, and no mordecai melamed should ever allow himself to say something so STUPID...

toonpig

Seems to be just what happened in Poland they learned how to do it from the Nazi & learned well. Thieves looters murders But uncle sam looked other way

Picaboca

Kinda like what the Germans did...

James Moss

hasbara

Greg Tamaki

Anti-Semetic bullshit.

dmxi

@greg
"Anti-Semetic bullshit."
those words form a bullet-proof vest,don't they?

robertolapiedra

I think anyone calling bullshit without expressing an explanation is a bullshitter. RL.

IIE_Nath

I hope you know that a "Semetic" is not synonymous with "Jewish" and that it refers to a body of culture that speaks one of the at least twelve Semetic languages so you can have a semitic arab that is not fond of the jewish culture.

Please educate your self before blurting out opinions.

Every culture has hard times and as appoussed to looking in the mirror and saying we f'd up its a lot easier to say its the fault of the heathans over the next hill. The world needs to wake up to itself.

Ran Miller

What a load of crap... they dont have a culture nor specific literature, so they claim the Jews stole it...

robertolapiedra

''They'' have a culture (Palestinians even have a Ministry of Culture!) and ''they'' have a specific literature (many Palestinian authors!). You have books in the National Library (6000 at least) that the Israeli government confirms (Jewish sources confirm this!) having obtained from the ''non Jewish'' population.

If you think that all this is a ''load of crap'', tell the Israeli Government to stop confirming they have books that were : ''stolen'', ''looted'', ''confiscated'', ''borrowed for more than 60 years'' or just ''abandoned for magical reasons'' for it to collate and classify. You should enlighten them with your personal culture. Do not forget to cite the specific literature that makes your case. RL.

Winston Smith

Oh no, Israelis are perfect.. they're not like every other group of people on the planet.

Aysh Ash

national library could have photocopies of these books..and the original books should be returned to Palestinian....or these books could be publish on internet, if it is possible..

Ferenc Csicseri

So I' guess the Jews has they own Demons to face,over and over so they are very similar to the Nazis

Masoudd

The palestinian culture was present before your jews tried to remove it , and please dont just comment foolishly on things you know so little off .

Monique Wyatt

SAD!!!! I intentionally used upper-case. Books are knowledge and freedom to understanding our own culture and roots. To have such treasures looted by the Israelis is despicable and upseting

youthforreform

You mean that people who have lived in Palestine for 100s of years were unable to formulate any culture? How did they communicate, conduct trade, business etc? You don't think there were oh I don't know a select few individuals who after all this time would've contributed to literature? Were all these millions of ppl so uneducated for all this time?That's ur argument?
Btw, did u miss the 100s of books aligned in row after row? Ladies and gentlemen, get this guy a pair of glasses or better yet a whole new brain.

madscirat

Ten internets to Aljazera for making beautiful documentaries and showing a side of the story so often silenced in the West. I personally do not think a people need to demonstrate some deep cultural heritage in order to justify their existence, but these images of Palestinian culture before the war present good evidence to refute those SOBs among us who do.

Jarrod Armstrong

hatred towards any group that indulges criminal behaviour and human rights abuses is actually the correct human response. Just because this group are israeli jews is neither here nor there, it is not racist but actually the correct moral response, else why are nazis hated?

SurvivorVeteran

Keep that head buried....

Mark Espinola

More Aljazera anti-Israeli bashing.

Stacey E M Jones

OMG are you serious, this kind of lies and garbage should not be aloud posted

seaki ache'

Those of you that are bashing and using the threat "anti-semitism",(yes it is NOW a threat of ANYONE that wants to expose the dangers and mistreatment of people in this region of the world). My husband is jewish, a cabblistic trainer and teacher of judaic spirituality. He spoke about this subject during one of our dinner parties that we have for other "free-thinkers". I have to admit, I did not believe him, as he has his own issues with his religion and how he was treated as a gay man of jewish dececent by his religion. The topic popped up a few years later, I then took matters in my own hands, and did a google search on the subject, talked to a few people here in New York that experienced it this travesty first hand. This documentary should have been braver and MORE harsher, EVERYTHING was "sugar-coated" and made to seem mild. What REALLY happened is a serious mis- justice to the native arab people of that reason. One example I share, and other teacher that was a boy in the region during that time, watched in horror as Isreali solidiers , or "foot-men" shot is father in the chest, because the man REFUSED to give up a priceless heirloom, a engraved,golden koran that had been in his family for over 400 years. The older gentlemen relied to me with tears in my eyes and it broke my heart. He said that EVERYTHING of value was stolen, and the family allowed this, but stood their ground when the soldiers reached for the priceless Koran. Luckly, I was told, his father lived, but was a broken man for the rest of his life. Call me an "anti-semite" if you want, but when bad people do bad things to other people, I will gladly own what ever you call me,if it allows me to spread the truth and heal others from their pain. What these people did to the palestinians is disgusting, and it has NOTHING to do with FAITH or RELIGION, but greed and corruption. And Further more , why are the jews do dang special ANYWAY? Every race on this earth has commented the SAME atrocities to their people, but the jews cant?,...what,... are they special? God's chosen people, I call "bull-hockey", WE ARE ALL GODS chosen people WE ARE ALL Gods children made in his image, and WE ALL deserve his love and devotion.

TdotW

anti-semitism is neither here nor there on this subject, the only subject that should be mentioned is the plight of the palestinian people... if anti-semitism is your only response to the information you've just been given then you lack intelligence

Tarek Badawi

Excellent documentary. Thanks for posting it here. I feel like I want to buy and read every old Palestinian book I can get my hands on. It's too bad I cannot ask my Grandfather and my father anymore which books they had at home in Jaffa.

Michael Davison

The Palestinian Arabs themselves denied for years that there was any such thing as a unique Palestinian culture.

The Arab delegation appointed to attend the Paris Peace Conference in 1919 adopted the following resolution:
“We consider ‘Palestine’ as part of Arab Syria, as it has never been separated from it at any time. We are connected with it by national, religious, linguistic, natural, economic, and geographical bonds.”

In March 1977 Zuheir Muhsin, a member of the PLO Executive Committee, gave an interview with the Dutch newspaper Trouw, in which he is quoted as saying:
“The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle
against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct Palestinian people to oppose Zionism.

“For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa, while as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan.”

Lastly, in his official biography, Yasser Arafat is quoted:
"If there is any such thing as a 'Palestinian people', it is I, Yasser Arafat, who created them."

When these people insist that there's no such thing as a Palestinian people, maybe we should listen to them, because it's likely they know what they're talking about more than you or I...

usman iftikhar

excellent documentary. the greatest killer of humanity even not spare the cultural heritage.

Bilbo Bagginski

Tell that to the Ukrainians. You know, the state that became a country in 1991. Or the other Baltic states which were part of Russia for hundreds of years. These quotes are taken completely out of context to begin with. The word Peleset comes from Egypt. It was first found over a thousand years B.C. Please, stop with the changing of history. Here's a quote:

“If
I were an Arab leader, I would never sign an agreement with Israel. It
is normal; we have taken their country. It is true God promised it to
us, but how could that interest them? Our God is not theirs. There has
been Anti - Semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their
fault ? They see but one thing: we have come and we have stolen their
country. Why would they accept that?”

David Ben-Gurion quotes (Polish born Israeli Statesman and Prime Minister (1948-53, 1955-63). Chief architect of the state of Israel and revered as Father of the Nation, 1886-1973)

Michael Davison

Yes, we know that quote, deliberately given out of context by Ilan Pappe, the man who was fired from his position as a tenured professor from the University of Haifa for academic dishonesty.

The truth of the matter is just what has been declared by Arab "leaders" for over a century-- "Muslim land will remain Muslim land until Judgment Day".

It wouldn't matter if Israel was governed by Jews, Christians, Bahais, Zoroastrans, Buddhists or Little Green Men from Mars. As long as "Muslim land" is ruled by "infidels", Muslims will not rest.

FYI: the word Pleshet comes from the Hebrew, not from Egypt. It's the root for the wird "invader", which is just what the Philistines (Plishtim, in Hebrew) were: invading Greek sea-people.

Of course, I realize that facts are irrelevant to you, just as they are to most pro-Palestinians, since facts contradict the Palestinian Arab narrative. It's basically a case of "My mind is made up, don't confuse me with facts".

Bilbo Bagginski

The facts? Facts are - Palestinian Arabs had been living in that land way before the first wave of European Jews moved over there. They are the indigenous people of that land being pushed out of their home. Period.

Michael Davison

The real fact is that there has been a Jewish presence in Israel for over three thousand years-- while Arabs were living an illiterate, nomadic existence in goatskin tents in the Arabian Peninsula.

Far from being indigenous, Arabs were just one more in a long line of conquerors who came through the area... among them Macedonians, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Arabs, European Crusaders, Kurds, Mamluks, Egyptians, Ottomans and British. None of them were indigenous.

It may interest you to know that according to Israel's Central Bureau of Statistics, that about 60% of Israel's Jewish population was either born in or the progeny of those who were born in Arab/Muslim countries around the Middle East and North Africa and expelled by Arab governments between 1949 and 1970. The actual umber of those expelled is over one million-- more than there were Palestinian "refugees".

If you want to learn about Jewish refugees, go to www (dot) jimena (dot) org - Jews Indigenous to the Middle East and North Africa. Find out just how wrong you are.

Bilbo Bagginski

so that give you the right to expel the indigenous people? Wow... you're right, I learned something.

Michael Davison

Since the Beirut Institute for Palestinian Studies concluded that "68% of the Palestinian Arabs left their homes without ever seeing a Jewish soldier or hearing a shot fired", the expulsion narrative becomes a bit tired.

The only people who still believe the expulsion claims are "useful i*iots". Even the Palestinians themselves know better, as can be seen in numerous articles castigating the Arab League for its broken promises in 1948.

1. Research reported by the Arab-sponsored Institute for Palestine Studies in Beirut shows that “the majority of the Arab refugees in 1948 were not expelled . . . 68% left without seeing an Israeli soldier.”

2. Report in Jaffa newspaper Ash Sha’ab, January 30, 1948: “The first of our fifth column consists of those who abandon their houses and businesses and go to live elsewhere….At the first signs of trouble they take to their heels to escape sharing the burden of struggle.”

3. Jamal Husseini, Acting Chairman of the Palestine Arab Higher Committee, speaking to the United Nations Security Council. Quoted in the UNSC Official Records (N. 62), April23,1948,p.14 “The Arabs did not want to submit to a truce they rather preferred to abandon their homes, their belongings and everything they possessed in the world and leave the town. This is in fact what they did.”

4. From a memorandum by The Arab National Committee in Haifa to the Arab League Governments. 27 April 1948. “… when the delegation entered the conference room it proudly refused to sign the truce and asked that the evacuation of the Arab population and their transfer to neighboring Arab countries be facilitated.”

5. Emile Ghoury, secretary of the Palestinian Arab Higher Committee, in an interview with the Beirut Telegraph, Sept. 6, 1948: “The fact that
there are these refugees is the direct consequence of the act of the Arab states in opposing partition and the Jewish state. The Arab states agreed upon this policy unanimously and they must share in the solution of the problem.”

6. Jordanian daily newspaper Falistin, Feb 19, 1949: “The Arab states
which had encouraged the Palestinian Arabs to leave their homes temporarily in order to be out of the way of the Arab invasion armies, have failed to keep their promise to help these refugees.”

7. Radio broadcast by the Near East Arabic Broadcasting Station, Cyprus on April 3, 1949: “It must not be forgotten that the Arab Higher Committee encouraged the refugees’ flight from their homes in Jaffa, Haifa, and Jerusalem.”

8. Musa Alami, a leading Palestinian nationalist of the time, revealed the attitude of the fleeing Arabs in his article “The Lesson of Palestine”, Middle East Journal, Vol. 3, No. 4, October 1949, pp. 373-405. “The Arabs of Palestine left their homes, were scattered, and lost everything. But there remained one solid hope: The Arab armies were on the eve of their entry into Palestine to save the country and return things to their normal course, punish the
aggressor, and throw oppressive Zionism with its dreams and dangers into the sea. On May 14, 1948, crowds of Arabs stood by the roads leading to the frontiers of Palestine, enthusiastically welcoming the advancing armies”.

“Days and weeks passed, sufficient to accomplish the sacred mission, but the Arab armies did not save the country. They did nothing but let slip from their hands Acre, Sarafand, Lydda, Ramleh, Nazareth, most of the south and the rest of the north. Then hope fled.”

9. Statement by the Arab National Committee of Haifa in memorandum to the Arab States, April 27, 1950. Cited by Peter Dodd and Halim Barakat, “River Without Bridges. – A Study of the Exodus of the 1967 Arab Palestinian Refugees” Beirut 1969. “The removal of
the Arab inhabitants … was voluntary and was carried out at our request … The Arab delegation proudly asked for the evacuation of the Arabs and their removal to the neighboring Arab countries…. We are very glad to state that the Arabs guarded their honour and traditions with pride and greatness.”

10. Report by Habib Issa in the New York Lebanese newspaper, Al Hoda, June 8 1951: “The Secretary-General of the Arab League, Azzam Pasha, assured the Arab peoples that the occupation of Palestine and Tel Aviv would be as simple as a military promenade. He pointed out that they were already on the frontiers and that all the millions the Jews had spent on land and economic development would be easy booty, for it would be a simple matter to throw Jews into the Mediterranean.”
“Brotherly advice was given to the Arabs of Palestine to leave their land, homes and property and to stay temporarily in neighboring fraternal states, lest the guns of the invading Arab armies mow them down.”

11. Beirut Muslim weekly Kul-Shay, Aug. 19, 1951: “Who brought the
Palestinians to Lebanon as refugees, suffering now from the malign attitude of newspapers and communal leaders, who have neither honor nor conscience? Who brought them over in dire straits and penniless, after they lost their honor? The Arab states, and Lebanon amongst them, did it.”

12. Nimr el Hawari, the Commander of the Palestine Arab Youth Organization, in his book Sir Am Nakbah (The Secret Behind
the Disaster, published in Nazareth in 1955), quoted the Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Said as saying: “We will smash the country with our guns and obliterate every place the Jews seek shelter in. The Arabs should conduct their wives and children to safe areas until the fighting has died down.”

13. Egyptian daily Akhbar El Yom, Oct 12, 1963: “The 15th May, 1948
arrived… on that day the Mufti of Jerusalem appealed to the Arabs of Palestine to leave the country, because the Arab countries were about to enter and fight in their stead.”

14. Khaled al-`Azm, who served as Prime Minister of Syria in 1948 and 1949, wrote in his memoirs, Beirut 1973 (Part 1, pp. 386-387), that among the reasons for the Arab failure in 1948 was . . . “the call by the Arab Governments to the inhabitants of Palestine to evacuate it and to leave for the bordering Arab countries, after having sown
terror among them…Since 1948 we have been demanding the return of the refugees to their homes. But we ourselves are the ones who encouraged them to leave…We have brought destruction upon a million Arab refugees, by calling upon them and pleading with them to leave their land, their homes, their work and business…”

“Poverty is killing us, the symptoms are exhausting us and the souls are leaving our body, yet you are still searching for the way to provide aid, like one who is looking for a needle in a haystack or like the armies of your predecessors in the year of 1948, who forced us to leave [Israel], on the pretext of clearing the battlefields of civilians… So what will your summit do now?”

16. From Asmaa Jabir Balasimah Um Hasan, who fled Israel
in 1948. Quoted from Al-Ayyam May 16, 2006 per Palestinian Media Watch: “We heard sounds of explosions and of gunfire at the beginning of the summer in the year of the Nakbah [1948].
They told us: The Jews attacked our region and it is better to evacuate the village and return, after the battle is over. And indeed there were among us [who fled Israel] those who left a fire burning under the pot, those who left their flock [of sheep] and those who left their money and gold behind, based on the assumption that we would return after a few hours.”

17. Journalist Mahmud Al-Habbash, in the official PA paper, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, in his column “The Pulse of Life”, December 13, 2006: “The leaders and the elites promised us at the beginning of the “Catastrophe” [the establishment of Israel and the creation of refugee problem] in 1948, that the duration of the exile will not be long, and that it will not last more than a few days or months, and afterwards the refugees will return to their homes, which most of them did not leave only until they put their trust in those “Arkuvian” promises made by the leaders and the political elites. Afterwards, days passed, months, years and decades, and the promises were lost with the strain of the succession of events.”

These sources bare the lies of those who base their case for the Palestinian refugees solely on “expulsion by Israeli forces.”

Were there expulsions? Yes, there were some… after the residents fighting in Lydda (Lod) and Ramla surrendered and saw the IDF force passing them by, they took up their arms again and continued fighting. When they were defeated for a second time, the fighters were expelled to Jordanian territory.

The incessant prattling about “Plan Dalet” is part of this lie. Yes, there was a Plan Dalet and it was a contingency plan for expelling all Arabs. That’s just the point, it was a contingency plan that was never activated.

A study by the Beirut Institute for Palestinian Studies in 1969 concluded that “68% of the Arabs who left Palestine did so without ever seeing a Jewish soldier”. It’s unlikely that such an institution would make such a statement if there were any possible way to deny it.

Just for fun, here’s an 18th quote from none other then the President of the Palestinian Authority, made on Al-Palestina TV on July 6, 2010:

“Until the nakba” [calamity in Arabic - the loaded synonym for Israeli independence], he recounted, his family “was well-off in Safed.” When Abbas was 13, “we left on foot at night to the Jordan River...
Eventually we settled in Damascus... My father had money, and he spent his money methodically. After a year, when the money ran out, we began to work.

He admitted that his family fled just a week after the UN vote on partition, out of fear that the Jews would exact revenge for the part family members took in their participation of the Safed Massacre of 1929 and the Arab Riots of 1936 to 1939. Thousands of others did the same.

IF the Palestinians were actually the indigenous people of Palestine, would they have left their homes so easily and quickly? Records show that had the UN demanded the same criterion of living for 5 years in the country they left that the UN High Commissioner for Refugees requires, more than half of those who were classified as refugees by UNWRA would not have been classified as such.

You can go and take your "expulsion" and "indigenous people" arguments, Mr. Bilbo Bagginski, and insert them where the sun don't shine, because that's exactly where they belong... with the rest of the BS.

How does it feel to be a Leninesque "Useful I*iot"?

TomFooLery

Exactly where "IS" the origin of this JEWdah tribe?
If your being 'Fired' from every place you've ever worked, perhaps it is 'Not' the Employer's assninity, but Your own assinine behavior which has caused expullsion from "EVERY" Land ever occupied by this tribe.
And i mean EVERY! including Israel. Maybe not tomorrow ... BUT! it'll happen. It's their Legacy, heritage, cultural, demoir. To be expellable, is what a SEMITE is, a wandering band of sociopathetic, self-centered, ever indulgent glutan.

Pherhaps some would have had Palastinian peoples stick around for the arab genocide we know would have occurred in 1948, had the not left the embattled zones.

If the zionist are angered because Palastinian peoples left, And Jews heeded not the requests, requiring, and mandate that Nazi Germany declaration "WARNED" was coming, and fell upon concetefull ears, too boastful, too RICH, too High fallutin' ....Hitler told JEWS to leave....PERIOD!
If your arrogance spoke loudest in your mind...OH! he don't mean us. WELL?

Dennis

Thomas More --- Jews lived comfortably in many Muslim societies including Andalusia. Jews were prompted to move to Israel because of Israel's crimes against Palestinians and the outrage this caused. There is also substantial evidence of Zionists precipitating Jewish panic in these countries by actually bombing a synagogue, etc. Zionist are one of those types for whom the end justifies the means. Most grownups don't accept such a principle.

Dennis

The theft of books was no different in principle from the theft of land, homes, bank accounts, agricultural stocks, real property of all types, etc. As Pappe says: The greedy Zionists wanted everything but the people (Palestinians.) Thieves.

Michael M

I do not understand why the facts are ignored. Didn't the Palestinians leave because they were warned that Israel was going to be destroyed and everyone killed or driven out? When Israel defeated the aggressors, the Palestinians want to pretend they didn't expect to come back and find dead Israeli men, women and children littering the streets. Isn't the Muslim mantra to this day "drive Israel into the sea?
People keep comparing what Israel is doing to the Palestinian people to other dictators but there is no comparison. Can you imagine the Jews in Germany calling for the destruction of the German state?
In order to come to the correct solution, you need to come to terms with all the correct information and some of the correct information is that twice after Israel was given a home land Muslim armies attacked and attempted to wipe them out!
I think it is very sad that the Palestinian people are suffering, BUT.
How do you expect Israel to react?

Miname

To create the 'Jewish' state of Israel before (Messiahs) arrival is a Big, major sin. That is if One is a Jew. It The almighty who expelled the chosen people from the promised land. Not the Romans, not the Arabs or the Turks. IT was Adonai himself. For some sins the chosen people had committed. That is if one is Pius. If not, then its plain zionism.
And calling armed forces idf. Israeli defend force is a humongous oxymoron. Same goes with the name of the country: Jewish state of Israel. It ought to be The zionist (rasist) state of Israel.
Since its the Ashkenazim's cuts the tickets there.
Jews from Africa and Arab nations is treated as lowlifes by their Caucasian Rasist zionist lords.
Ben G. , Golda M. Menachem B. Moishe D. etc. no one of these is Messiah .